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Date Published: July 27, 2012

UPDATE: Unsigned letter sent to investors, details three investments.

JOHANNESBURG – A letter to investors in a scheme run by Herman Pretorius has confirmed the death of the former hedge fund boss. The unsigned communication, published in full below, has left unanswered questions over what Pretorius’s clients are invested in. It lists three investments, only two of which were previously known to Moneyweb. It does little to disclose the nature of the investments or who is left to manage them in the wake of Pretorius’s death.

On Thursday night, Pretorius allegedly shot his former business partner Julian Williams dead in his Cape Town offices, then turned the gun on himself.

Pretorius used to be involved with a hedge fund called the Abante Statistical Arbitrage. At the time of his death he ran an unregulated investment scheme called the Relative Value Arbritrage Fund (RVAF), which many investors believed to be a hedge fund.

Pretorius had been due to attend a meeting of investors in Moorreesburg on the evening of his death. Investors were informed that the event had been cancelled because Pretorius was in a meeting with Williams.